Data Analyst or Business Analyst, Which Role Is Right for You?

Are you considering a career in data analysis or business analysis? Both fields are growing much faster than average, offer attractive salaries, and can be good career choices. If you’re wondering which would better fit you, this post can help answer that question. Read on to explore the key similarities and differences between data analyst and business analyst careers.

Data analysts help organizations identify issues, understand trends, predict outcomes, and make recommendations through data analysis and interpretation. Your role as a data analyst can be essential to the success of any organization. The insights you provide into customer behavior, business operations, and market trends help the organization make informed decisions and evaluate the results of initiatives.

As a data analyst, you’ll work with large data sets, organizing and cleaning the data, then use statistical techniques to derive business insights. You’ll communicate your findings and recommendations through visualizations, reports, and presentations.

The O*NET OnLine database maintained by the U.S. Department of Labor includes Data Analyst among the job titles for its Business Intelligence Analyst category. Other job titles include:

• Competitive Intelligence Analyst
• Intelligence Analyst
• Market Intelligence Analyst
• Market Intelligence Consultant
• Strategic Business Consultant
• Technology Intelligence Consultant
• Strategist¹

As a data analyst, your skills are highly portable, and you can find a fulfilling career in a wide range of industries. Some of the best salaries are in research and development and the computing, insurance, and generalized business management industries.² Find more information about data analysts and business analytics careers in this blog post.

O*NET OnLine characterizes the job outlook for Business Intelligence Analysts as “bright,” with much faster than average growth through 2031.¹ The Business Intelligence Analyst category is a subset of O*NET’s more general Data Scientist category.

O*NET’s sister agency, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), says that total employment for data scientists was 113,300 in 2021 and projects overall growth of 35.8% through 2031.³

You need more than just technical skills to be a successful data analyst. O*NET OnLine lists these as the top five “soft” skills for data analysts.

• Critical thinking
• Reading comprehension
• Active listening
• Speaking
• Active learning¹

The top five technology skills on O*NET’s Hot Technologies list for data analysts are:

• Structured query language (SQL)
• Tableau
• Microsoft Excel
• Python
• R⁴

Today’s hot technology skills are only the beginning of your technical education in the Albers online MSBA. You’ll learn Python and R programming languages, along with data visualization and data wrangling tools and techniques.

The curriculum includes a foundational education in data management and analytics. Become familiar with popular structured, semi-structured and unstructured database systems in the database management course. Expand your statistical analysis skills with courses on big data analytics and machine learning models for solving business problems.

Develop the crucial critical thinking and communications skills in data translation challenges woven throughout the curriculum. Practice applying your technical skills and your ethical and stakeholder management frameworks in typical business situations.

Business analysts perform the critical task of bridging the gap between business needs and solutions to unlock opportunities for growth, innovation, and advancement in today's increasingly dynamic business environment.

As a business analyst, you'll leverage your understanding of business processes and technology to identify business needs and create or improve processes that help the organization reach its goals and improve its market position.

You'll collaborate with organization stakeholders to gather and analyze information about business strategy and processes and propose solutions to senior management. When a solution is adopted, you may prepare training and operational documents, monitor results and make necessary adjustments or corrections.

O*NET OnLine includes Business Analyst among the job titles for its Management Analyst category and characterizes the outlook for these roles as “bright.” Other job titles include:

• Management Consultant
• Administrative Analyst
• Business Consultant
• Employment Programs Analyst
• Organizational Development Consultant
• Performance Management Analyst
• Program Management Analyst⁵

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts 11% overall job growth for this category through 2031.⁶ In addition to the management analysts who work as organization staff members, a significant percentage are self-employed, as illustrated in the table below.

Management Analyst is a well-established career path, and the skills of management analysts are essential to companies across the industry spectrum. The BLS reported 950,600 people employed in this career group in 2021, and the general industry categories include everything from Arts and Entertainment to Manufacturing, Utilities, and Wholesale Trade.⁷

Management Analyst Employment and Growth Projections for Top Industries

The most important work activities for management analysts revolve around requirements gathering and process analysis, communication across many roles, developing good working relationships with others, and making decisions and solving problems. Extensive domain knowledge is a precursor to effective information gathering and problem-solving.

O*NET OnLine lists these as the top five skills for management analysts:

• Active listening
• Critical thinking
• Reading comprehension
• Complex problem solving
• Judgment and decision making⁵

The top five in-demand technologies for management analysts O*NET lists include:

• Microsoft Excel
• Microsoft Powerpoint
• Microsoft Office Software
• Structured query language
• Tableau or Microsoft Visio⁸

Gain a comprehensive understanding of modern business, and the skills to excel as a business analyst in any industry with the Albers online MBA. Each course in the program features a Leadership Challenge to help you develop an ethical, empathetic, and effective decision-making process vital to your long-term success.

The curriculum is organized into core and advanced courses, with the core courses providing a solid foundation in the range of marketing and leadership topics. Individual courses address ethics, leadership, decision-making, legal topics, marketing fundamentals and supply chain management. Master the financial side of business with a trio of courses on accounting, finance and economics.

Advanced courses contextualize business in today's interconnected economy by studying international management and the domestic and global economies. Deepen your interpersonal skills with professional and personal communications, negotiation, and people management courses. Develop your data and analytical skills with courses on data management, marketing analytics, corporate financial management, and managerial accounting.

There are many similarities and some significant differences between these two career paths.
Both roles offer you good salaries, plentiful job opportunities across a range of industries, and the chance to create significant business benefits. There are also overlaps in required skillsets, such as data analysis, problem-solving, and communication.

The key differences are your focus at work and specific competencies. Data analysts spend most of their time working with computers, analyzing data, using visualization tools, and preparing reports. They need a range of technical skills to accomplish their tasks.

On the other hand, business analysts spend more time working with other people, gathering information, scoping business problems and developing processes and strategies to address them. They need well-developed interpersonal skills, generalized frameworks for understanding business issues, and industry-specific knowledge.

Your earnings potential is similar in either career path and depends more on your particular role and industry. O*NET OnLine reports 2022 national median salaries of $95.290 for business analysts and $103,500 for data analysts.^{1, 5} Reviewing online job postings will give you more specific information for your desired industry and location.

Look within as the first step in creating a fulfilling career. Identify your strengths, interests, and career goals. In addition to thinking about what you enjoy doing and reviewing your accomplishments, taking career, personality, and interest assessments may be helpful. O*NET offers an interest profiler that links to the work activities and skills reported for different careers.

Next, compare your skills and interests to the typical requirements for specific occupations and research market trends and demand in your desired industry. You can conduct much of your research online; the sources cited in this post are a good place to start. State government and regional agencies can provide additional industry information.

It’s also a good idea to network with professionals in the field to get their perspectives and seek their advice. Professional associations and online interest groups can help you expand your business contacts, and the Albers faculty and alumni network are great resources for industry information and connections. Learn more about several Seattle University networking and career search resources.

Your long-term success depends on your business and technical skills and on doing work that aligns with your interests and supports your life goals. Aligning your career with your strengths and goals will create greater satisfaction for you and better results for your employer or clients.

Whether you are more drawn to the technical work of data analysts or the people and process-oriented work of business analysts, you’ll get a well-rounded education balancing ethical and business considerations at Seattle University. Build your career on a solid foundation with an online MBA or MSBA from Seattle University’s Albers School of Business and Economics.